The 2025 Rookie Class

[doclinkin]

Nat was the only one i remember really interested in Traore. It will be interesting to see how his career compares to Riley since Traore was drafted at 19. We traded down from 19 to pick Riley.

I liked both Traore and Riley. I think Dat liked Traore too. But I thought Traore might be available later.

[gambitx777]

It's likely we end up with two top 15 players form each of the last two drafts!

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[pcbothwel]

Nat was the only one i remember really interested in Traore. It will be interesting to see how his career compares to Riley since Traore was drafted at 19. We traded down from 19 to pick Riley.

I had Traore over Riley

Sorber/Coward/Fleming/Traore/Wolf/Beringer with 18 & 19

Not that Im feeling myself, but I'm doing pretty well the last couple of drafts.
For 2024, here was my final board where I had Sarr, Sheppard, Edey, Buzelis, and Castle as my top 5, and was MUCH lower on Dillingham, Risacher, Cody Williams, and Walter:

All-NBA:
N/A

Impact Starters/AS:
Sarr
Sheppard
Edey
Buzelis

Impact Starter/No AS:
Castle
Topic
Holland
Clingan

Solid Starter/Bench player on Contender:
Dillingham
Knecht
Risacher
Carter
Durisic
Simpson
Shannon Jr
Da Silva
Ware
Collier
Holmes
Dadiet
Christie

Fringe Starter/Bench player:
Ighodaro
Shead
Alexander
Salaun
Cody Williams
Walter
Filipowski
Missi
Kolek
Furphy
George
Hall

[The Consiglieri]

Hugo Gonzalez posting one of the best plus minuses of a rookie https://www.statmuse.com/nba/ask/highest-nba-rookie-plus-minus

Top 5 for total +\- for all current rookies (from yesterday)

H. González: +236

D. Harper: +117

VJ Edgecombe: +69

K. Knueppel: +59

J. Beringer: +45

Top 5 +\- per game by rookies all time (min 40 games played):

H. González: 5.36

T. Duncan: 5.23

C. Holmgren: 5.15

B. Simmons: 4.78

D. Mitchell: 4.52

J. Tatum: 4.3

If memory serves, I think Gonzalez was one of those guys that dropped quite a bit between summer '24 and draft day '25.

[closg00]

Hugo Gonzalez posting one of the best plus minuses of a rookie https://www.statmuse.com/nba/ask/highest-nba-rookie-plus-minus

Top 5 for total +\- for all current rookies (from yesterday)

H. González: +236

D. Harper: +117

VJ Edgecombe: +69

K. Knueppel: +59

J. Beringer: +45

Top 5 +\- per game by rookies all time (min 40 games played):

H. González: 5.36

T. Duncan: 5.23

C. Holmgren: 5.15

B. Simmons: 4.78

D. Mitchell: 4.52

J. Tatum: 4.3

If memory serves, I think Gonzalez was one of those guys that dropped quite a bit between summer '24 and draft day '25.

Whatever Gonzalez is doing, it doesn't show on the stat sheet, his last 10 games he usually scores 2 points per game, I wonder if it's because he plays on the well-oiled machine of the Boston Celtics.

[The Consiglieri]

I expect to see Nolan on the Rookie Ladder soon, his 3-point shooting is at 48% over the last 5 games as he has shown steady improvement in all facets of running the point, and he is only 19.

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I think there were a couple of us who liked him, but I think in all of our interest, it was pure speculative upside play. We all could see what could happen ideally, but a lot of things would have to lock into place to make him a legit weapon that simply weren't there with any consistency yet. I've always been particular about hating when people just fixate on their guy, instead of being a bit more Dat oriented and tiering out their preferences. For me, Nolan was in a pile of guys that I was interested in, that, lol, ended with Will Reilly (the other guys were Demin, Essengue, Sorber, Beringer, Traore,McNeely, Fleming etc)....Seems like it's still the same sorta thing, If Traore can become a closer to more complete player with his traits, he can be really good, but there's a lot of pieces that have got to be put together to be anything beyond flashes. What attracted me to him in our 2nd slotted 1st was that potential, that's exactly what I want to take swings on, all my desired guys fit that profile: lotta upside, lotta downside risk, generally). I like what we did all the same, there was enough in Reilly's profile to suggest he could be good, or at bare minimum, pretty solid as a tool, probably not great, but a better chance of being "pretty good or good" then some of the others.

[payitforward]

My problem is that I haven't been able to predict the future since the time I flipped a coin about a pair of players & it landed on my crystal ball & broke it!

[closg00]

A fun, way too-early exercise.

Watch on YouTube

[closg00]

ROY him, but you know they will give it to the Golden Child. It could be the first time classmates have finished 1 & 2.

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[The Consiglieri]

I spent a couple of months trashing him as a floor pick, just couldn't see him becoming what he clearly has, my only saving grace is I made a point of noting how when Duke had to turn to him to carry the load when Flagg had an injury that knocked him out of the Conference Championship, Kon killed it (or probably more accurately, did a good job to a very good job in those games last march before the tourney).

[closg00]

Selected two picks after Jamir, seasoned in the G League and called-up now by Minny.

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[nate33]

Selected two picks after Jamir, seasoned in the G League and called-up now by Minny.

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He was the guy I liked with our SRP.

That said, performing well in the G-League does not necessarily translate to the NBA. For big men, the talent disparity is massive.

[closg00]

Selected two picks after Jamir, seasoned in the G League and called-up now by Minny.

Read on Twitter

He was the guy I liked with our SRP.

That said, performing well in the G-League does not necessarily translate to the NBA. For big men, the talent disparity is massive.

Yeah, for where he was picked, you use him to harass
Wemby, and get him some lobs, could turn into something in 5 years.

[closg00]

A couple of articles on the troubles with of Derik Queen. Considering how the Pels season is going, I wonder if Dumars gets fired if ATL gets a Top-5 pick. I am still a believer in DQ and his upside, but I’m not sure his D can be fixed, we won’t know until he has fully mature into his body.

https://www.si.com/nba/pelicans/onsi/editorial/pelicans-derik-queen-concerns-go-bad-worse-latest-stretch-01kk6yb1hrk5

https://www.si.com/nba/pelicans/onsi/editorial/pelicans-derik-queen-problem-persists-amid-winning-streak-01km61f8napk

[closg00]

Khaman got his first start after playing full time in the G League, if he continues to develop his offensive game, watch out!

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[doclinkin]

Sigh. That was my draft. Khaman and Rasheer.

Happy with Riley though. Hope Tre comes back strong.

[closg00]

Sigh. That was my draft. Khaman and Rasheer.

Happy with Riley though. Hope Tre comes back strong.

NGL, it would have been so nasty having Khaman and Alex anchoring the middle going-forward, I was afraid Khaman would be kicked out of the country due to the Visa ban on all countries with brown or Muslim populations.

[payitforward]

I was on the Khaman train as well. Huge upside.

[nate33]

Sigh. That was my draft. Khaman and Rasheer.

Happy with Riley though. Hope Tre comes back strong.

Did you have Khaman ahead of Tre on your draft board? Or was Khaman your default pick at #6 assuming the top 5 would be Flagg, Harper, VJ, Ace and Tre? (At the time, nobody had Kon going in the top 5.)

[The Consiglieri]

Sigh. That was my draft. Khaman and Rasheer.

Happy with Riley though. Hope Tre comes back strong.

Did you have Khaman ahead of Tre on your draft board? Or was Khaman your default pick at #6 assuming the top 5 would be Flagg, Harper, VJ, Ace and Tre? (At the time, nobody had Kon going in the top 5.)

I think a couple of us wanted to move down for Maluach a little bit, or just take him at slot if a trade wasn't available. I didn't expect him to fall that far, I had assumed he'd go off the board, 6, 7 or 8.

I kind of was talked into Tre by the consensus emerging in the final weeks, I still think Tre will be fine, but my fears that his impact would be limited as a player I think are accurate. He's probably at best a 4th piece on a good/great team, and considering we have no clear emphatic 1st, 2nd or 3rd piece other than rental agreements with AD and Trae, that's a pretty huge problem (I do think 1 and possibly both of Sarr and Riley will emerge as something between a 2nd to 4th option on a very good team).

Like Doc, Rasheer and Maluach were targets for me, but Rasheer was in a huge glop of a group, at our slot, the guys that most interested me were Fears and Maluach in trade downs, or a trade the house except for our '26 first, to move up.